DataBaseball
2026
Matt Thaiss headshot

C · 2025

Matt Thaiss

Age
30
B/T
L/R
Height
5' 11"
Weight
215 lb
Born
May 6, 1995 in Jackson, NJ, USA
MLB debut
July 3, 2019
Drafted
2013, round 32
College
Virginia
High school
Jackson
Salary, 2025
$1M
dbWAR
1.3
2 season(s)
PA
190
AVG
.218
OBP
.349
SLG
.288
wRC+
92
100 = avg

Matt Thaiss is a catcher for the Chicago White Sox. In 2025 he hit 1 home run and knocked in 16 RBIs, notching 34 hits across 190 plate appearances in 59 games. His batting average was .218, 11.1% lower than the league average of .245. He reached base at a .349 clip and slugged .288, for an OPS of .638, 11.3% lower than the league mark of .719 — 12th of 15 on his team, and 327th of 461 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 87.9 mph off the bat, hit 43.2% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 4.5% of them and made contact on 71.1% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 92 wRC+ puts his offence 8% below average. That comes to 0.7 dbWAR — -1.9 runs with the bat, -0.6 on the bases, +3.4 for the position he plays, against replacement level. It includes no fielding: defensive runs are proprietary and are not estimated here, so the figure credits playing a demanding position but not playing it well.

League context

Percentile among qualified batters, 2025.

wRC+92
wOBA.303
ISO.071
BB%15.3%
WAR.7

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2025. These four terms sum to +7.1 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.

Batting-1.9Baserunning-0.6Position+3.4Replacement+6.3
BattingBaserunningPositionReplacement

WAR by season

0.70.40.02425

Platoon splits

How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.

Batting by the hand the pitcher throws with, 2025. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
SplitPAABHHRBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBAK%
vs LHP28245026.208.296.292.27221.4%
vs RHP1621322912740.220.358.288.30824.7%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2025.

Loading 111 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 111 tracked batted balls in 2025. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate
4.5%
5 barrels
Exit velocity
87.9
mph average
Max exit velo
109.9
mph, hardest hit
Hard hit
43.2%
95 mph or better
Sweet spot
32.4%
8–32° launch
Launch angle
13.9°
average
Barrel rate4.5%
Exit velocity87.9 mph
Hard hit rate43.2%
Contact rate71.1%

A barrel is a batted ball whose exit velocity and launch angle have historically produced at least a .500 average and 1.500 slugging — 98 mph within 26–30°, widening to 8–50° by 116 mph. Reconstructed from Statcast's published anchor points, which reproduces them exactly; the interior is within a degree. Sweet spot (8–32°) is an exact definition.

Hot and cold zones

Batting average by pitch location, 2025.

.000.000.1258 AB.00010 AB7 AB.17617 AB.31822 AB.38513 AB.30020 AB.33321 AB.30010 AB
Below averageLeague averageAbove average
Batting average by location of the pitch that ended each plate appearance, catcher's view. The bordered square is the strike zone; the outer band is chase territory. Cells with fewer than 8 at-bats are left grey rather than shown as signal. League average on the same attribution is .245.

Situational hitting

How Matt Thaiss hits by base state, outs, score and late-game pressure — each read against his own season line.

Split by
By who is on base when he comes up. The season line is repeated as the baseline.
SituationPAABHHRRBIBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBA
All situations190.218.349.288.303
Bases empty988217001519.207.337.244.283
Runner on first5043913715.209.320.302.290
Runners on9274171161427.230.363.338.324
RISP42318013712.258.415.387.366

Runners on includes runners in scoring position, which is the convention every reference uses. Counted from play-by-play, 2025.

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
2025591903411612946.218.349.288.071.30015.3%24.2%.303-1.9920.7
2024571863221632858.204.323.299.096.30615.1%31.2%.289-3.5830.6

Head to head

Put Matt Thaiss beside up to three others.

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Matt Thaiss

Similar players

Nearest 2025 seasons by discipline, contact, power and speed, on rate statistics rather than totals.

How these are computed

wOBA uses linear weights measured from this season's own play-by-play rather than published constants, and wRC+ is park-adjusted against that same league. dbWAR is our own open implementation — not fWAR or bWAR — and the full derivation, including its simplifications, is on the methodology page.